23.1.12

Earlier this week I heard the news that Ofcom, the uk communications watchdog had withdrawn PressTVs UK license. They cited some bullshit fine and pointed at Iranian editorial oversight.

Fuck you Ofcom, and the decision tree that led to this. I hope you rot in a Shepherd's Bush.

Sometimes acts of evil epistemicide, the killing of ways of knowing, occur that are strategic and have impacts far into the future. Like about 10 years ago when UK Zionists put Hamas on a terrorist list. I wonder if this is one of those instances, or if its actually that important in the general pattern of our maturing processes.

The human rights bitches have had their knives out for PressTV for a while. When I would visit a house with a TV and facility to view the channel, I would make sure I would have a look. Good stuff on a budget and in the context of a lot of drivel and developmentia. Presstv lived in a tv ecology that included Channel S, Peace TV, Aljazeera and Channel 4.

What I liked is that they would take our parents opinions, ie the truth, and run with them as far as they could. None of that white veneering that media workers of colour have to serve us under the duress of white structures of power. None of that dependence on advertising that infantalises other outlets.

20.1.12

Quilliam Responds to ‘Attempted
Coup’ card played by Government of Bangladesh 19 January 2012

We would like
to expresses our excitement to hear the Awami League government is alleging
that it has foiled a military coup in Bangladesh. This is not a ruse to deflect
attention from them banging up Islamists left, right and centre. It means we
can jump up and down and pretend that we know what is going on. The coup is
said to have occurred on 22 December 2011, but has only been announced today by
the Bangladeshi authorities. We do not find anything dubious in the previous
sentence. BDNews 24, a Bangladeshi website is quoted as saying that on 22nd
December 2011, Major Li-Miffed, an alleged Hizb ut-Tahrir leaflet holder,
farted in the general direction of the gloriously liberated Bangladesh
government. In company I tell you.

Some Army fellow that we met at a terrorisation and intimidation conference has
confirmed to Quilliam that they have very strong suspicions that the coup is
the work of Hizb ut-Tahrir. This is because secular power in Bangladesh can’t
tell its arse from its elbows. Quilliam knows, because we used to be members,
that Hizb ut-Tahrir printed a few leaflets and talked to some army people in
Bangladesh. We don’t know anything about the constellation of Islamic valued
movements and shakements in Bangladesh. This is a game of language and power. Who
promotes the use of military coups to gain power? [ Oh that was you the
British government in Jan 2007]

[insert
incomprehensible anonymous quote to mimic empirical insight]

"(change would) normally be...by
the Party seeking to access the military in order to take the authority...After
this the military would be capable of establishing the authority of Islām [did
you see what I did to that a ?. smugface]. Hence a coup d'etat would be the
manifestation of a political change...”

The anonymous source goes on to say that that Hizb ut-Tahrir has been actively
targeting Bangladesh since the mutiny of the Bangladesh Rifle unit in 2009,
when over 70 military personnel and civilians were killed. See we don’t know
anything about Bangladesh, it was called the Bangladesh Rifles and there has
been no independent investigation of this. Impossible with a pro-India regime.

This attempted military coup follows the 2011 Pakistani military coup attempt
that wasn’t really an attempt, more of a dinner party. This charade was pinned
on Brigadier Ailing Khandahar and four other senior military officers, all of
whom were announced by the Armed Forces spokesperson as having ties to Hizb
ut-Tahrir because they were handed a leaflet after juma prayers and thought the
political parties were rubbish..

The porous border between Bangladesh and India is one that is being monopolised
by extremist groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, to recruit Islamist fighters to
carry out attacks similar to those in Mumbai in 2008. I who am writing this, am
a shameless bastard, because I know that Bangladeshis are routinely killed,
beaten and bribed at the border. Maybe I should have passed this over to ‘Ed’
Hussain, but he’s in the US and is passing himself off as Assamese, if not
white, cant remember.

Raam Pant Nob-Jawqi, our Native Informant Paki said

‘I have visited Bangladesh several times to chat my usual shit, self publicise
and serve white power. I am therefore extremely proud to hear that the government
is using my former group in its eyewash’.

This political charade follows the British Government’s reduction in
Dhaka-based counter development tourism. We were planning to link up with those
bad boys in CRAP and Gram Mean to hijack local ideas like we did in Pakistan with that khudi propaganda.

We would like to finger some cash off the government, to spy on Muslims and
annoy them please. East London here we come.

Norman Terawala, who is older than me said this highly general wishy-washy statement
because you probably care about the oil and domination in the Middle East, and
we all think we’re Arabs. Did I tell you the one about my ancestor...

‘This attempted coup is contrary to recent democratization trends witnessed in
the Arab Uprisings, and Hizb ut-Tahrir appears to be ignoring the new realities
in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia and other Arab Muslim majority countries. As such,
Hizb ut-Tahrir and its narrative are no longer relevant to the masses of youth
striving for a third way [ HT Tony and late Mu’ammar] between extremism
and dictatorships [ Zzzzz, are we done yet?]’.

18.1.12

One of the criticisms of Sarmila Bose's intellectual mooning at the Awami death script of 1971 was that she relegated the accounts of the less educated witnesses and raised the accounts of the pakistani military, and that this was an unjust thing to do.

I think this is educated people hiding behind uneducated people, using their uneducation as a device to enrol your sympathy and cover their bare behinds.

Its a hallmark of developmentia.

One of the things that powerful and criminal have in their favour is that their centrality grants an authoratative view, which they can misuse, and claim on a hard-to-assail privileged view.

In the war crimes court transcrpts im detecting a similar occurence, educated people have been busy coaching and fabricated witnesses out of vulnerable population.These witnesses have been shown for what they have are by the defence.

It makes you wonder how the bargain was struck between the core and the periphery of the League through local MPs. This makes you wonder whther the deal can be unstruck too.

So truthers need to know, who was present in heavy decision and death making scenarios over those 9 months and what was said by whom. This is why the Pakistani military is important and problematic.

Accounts of events mean less if the participant wasnt there. ...of course none of this matters if you base your closed systems view on peripheral experiences, hearsay, delusions and badly imputed facts.

The backers of the bangladesh was trial have Nuremburg on their minds. This is why the 3 million figure was important, because it was of the same order as the Holocaust and gets you to the same spaces and discursive tool book. In these Nuremberg Trials, i am told, 'hearsay' was elevated to ridiulous levels.

12.1.12

Syed Sajjad Hussain wrote a book called The Wastes of Time detailing his reflections of 1971. He was a student of Dhaka Uni in the 1940s, and then English Literature professor who became VC of Rajshahi who was transferred to Dhaka Uni around June July 1971.

He was a staunch supporter of the ideals of Pakistan as he saw them, not a Bengali Nationalist at all, and I wish he were alive to ask him questions. Theres another of his books thats useful, called the young Muslims guide to the Modern world. When I go to Dhaka and search for penetrating writing on Islam in the world, its basically only his stuff that keeps coming up. This speaks volumes about the spiritual-intellectual momentum of the place.

Im revisiting The Wastes of Time as its been about ten years, and events are unfolding now that require some BS detecting. He was beaten mercilessly and left for dead following the surrender of Pakistani forces on December 19th. His experiences of jail, betrayal and our people are very thoughtfully written.

In a bookshop somewhere between the two gulshans some years ago I remember having a discursive 'altercation' with a then present student of Dhaka Uni who was working there. I learnt how the young are brought up carefully to tread only on the steps that have been chosen.

Will post the link here in a bit. But im very interested in collecting recollections of decisions made by the 1972 cabal of gangsters who took over the asylum courtesy of the Indian Army and our historic foolishnesses.

The Bose wars of last year were a fascinating eye into how easy it can be to make better sense than the nonsense thats peddled out there. The positionality of the deshi suspended from space is great too. Diaspority provides this, less vulnerability to the cult of shubidabaddiness.

4.1.12

As the Bangladesh War Crimes Trial is unfolding several new understandings are being made.
Recently, Holiday published news of how several of the witnesses to date have criminality and beholdenness to government clouding their testimony. The same publication also features a discussion of the history|futurity of the issue, how in the Awami script you must be a freedom fighter for all time and it doesn't matter what you are now, and how in the BNP script its the present and the future that matters.

But how are these scripts and documents created, and what is their role on (un)consciousness raising, (non)fact distilling and (in)justice making?

I live in London but think of desh a lot. It is incredible how political lies have become the basis of the state and I'm fortunate enough for my employment, status and safety not to be threatened by refusing to see truth in the emotional game being played right now.

In the UK, the trial of some of those accused of the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence has reached a result. A lot of hard work went into this and one important provocative document was the BBC1 documentary The boys who killed Stephen Lawrence. Some reviews called it tenacious but futile, the police didnt like it of course. But its impact on the ecology of justice might be something worth pondering.

Documentaries on the nonwest made for the viewing of white structures of power have an uncomfortabley heavy weight in Bangladesh. In relation to the war crimes trials, Channel 4's 1995 The War Crimes File, from Twenty twenty Television is crucial to view.

It is easy to string together and then believe a visually compelling that you do not have the resources or inclination to contest. The time to pool our resources and inclinations is now.

And we are in luck because the prison has escape encoded in its very bars.

This documentary is important to appreciate, deconstruct and reconstruct. It is additionally fascinating given its cast, director ( David Bergman, New Age hack, War Crimes Trials reporter and son -in-law of ex Foreign Minister Kamal Hossain (i think)), and cheerleaders (Gita Saghal, Shahriar Kabir et al) . More generally The War Crimes File can be seen as part of a genre
of film making that we should supersede with polyphonic approaches and
multiple axes of critical reflection.

As our understanding of what really happened in 1971 deepens and truthens these archives and the (non)sense in them are crying out for greater scrutiny. As a non supporter-follower of this trial, I see that eye witnesses are proving to be the hearsay of the politically leaned upon, criminals, party workers and freedom fighter benefit chancers. What of the cast?

I am wondering about what it means as a political project.
Imran Khan has declared his ambition to deliver one with his party in pakistan. Many have tried to in the past and it is an aspiration shared by many. It forces you to think what an islamic polity does.

Kalyan = Welfare

There are plenty of organisation dedicated to this, technocratically. Yet state power has benefits.

Think state as form of polity space, rather than through land worshipping and exclusivistic nationalisms.

A state that enables and assists virtuosity by strengthening, hopening and guarding people.
We are the state for now, I guess. So craft that organisational ecology, nurture that episteamology.

Islamic, now thats what i call a big adjective.
Of course theres a need to call it and not apologise-overcompensate. Let it convey through action to.